page_title: Battle of Isaszeg (1849)
section_title: Aftermath
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Isaszeg (1849) / Aftermath
context_page_description: The Battle of Isaszeg took place in the Spring Campaign of the Hungarian War of Independence from 1848 to 1849, between the Austrian Empire and the Hungarian Revolutionary Army supplemented by Polish volunteers. The Austrian forces were led by Field Marshal Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätz and the Hungarians by General Artúr Görgei. The battle was one of several engagements between the Hungarian Revolutionary Army and the Imperial counter-revolutionary main army and was one of the turning points of the Hungarian War of Independence.
  The Hungarian victory precipitated a series of setbacks to the Habsburg Imperial Armies in April–May 1849, forcing them to retreat from occupied central and western Hungary towards the western border and convinced the Hungarian National Assembly to issue the Hungarian Declaration of Independence. Windisch-Grätz was dismissed from the leadership of the Imperial forces in Hungary on 12 April 1849, six days after the defeat.
context_section_description: The battle of Isaszeg, following the Battle of Kápolna, was the second confrontation between the Hungarian revolutionary and the Austrian armies. Although it was not a crushing defeat for either of the combatants, it influenced the morale both of the victors and of the defeated. While the Hungarian generals, with the exception of Ándrás Gáspár, showed the ability to take decisions when they were on their own, the Imperial generals, other than Franz Schlik, failed from this point of view. Windisch-Grätz misunderstood the situation completely before the battle, scattering his troops, so that Anton Csorich's II Corps and Georg Heinrich Ramberg's division could not participate in the battle. Although Görgei had made mistakes too, such as wrongly believing that Gáspár had joined the battle, he succeeded in committing the majority of his troops and winning the battle. The battle of Isaszeg was in contrast to the Battle of Kápolna where, in a similar situation, the Hungarian commander Henryk Dembiński had failed to co-ordinate his troops on the battlefield, allowing Windisch-Grätz to win.
  The most important result of the battle was that the military initiative was taken for two months by the Hungarian army, while the Habsburg army was defeated in a series of battles (Battle of Vác, Battle of Nagysalló, Battle of Komárom, Siege of Buda), and forced to retreat towards the west. Also the Battle of Isaszeg played a decisive role in Windisch-Grätz being relieved of command of the Habsburg armies by the emperor on 12 April, who named Feldzeugmeister Ludwig von Welden in his place, although until his arrival his duties were fulfilled by Josip Jelačić. The changes in the leadership did not produce a change in the military situation for the Austrian side, their situation continuing to worsen day by day because of the new defeats they suffered, which caused their retreat from almost all the territory they occupied in Hungary between December and March.
  On the day after the battle of Isaszeg, Lajos Kossuth, the President of the National Defense Committee arrived in Gödöllő and moved into the Grassalkovich Palace, which had been Windisch-Grätz's headquarters until the previous day. Here he formulated the Hungarian Declaration of Independence, which declared the removal of the House of Habsburg from the leadership of Hungary and Hungary's total independence. Although independence was declared on 14 April 1849 in Debrecen,  it was decided in Gödöllő following the victories of the Spring Campaign, and in particular the Battle of Isaszeg.
  Also in Gödöllő the plan for the second phase of the Spring Campaign was formulated. This plan was based on making the Imperial high command believe that the Hungarian army wanted to liberate the capitals of Hungary: Pest and Buda, when in fact their main forces would move north, liberating the Hungarian fortress of Komárom, besieged since January by the Imperial forces. While II Corps under Lajos Aulich remained in front of Pest, with the duty of misleading the Imperial forces, making such brilliant military manoeuvres that the Austrian commanders thought that the Hungarian main forces were still in front of the capital planning to make a frontal attack against it, the I, III and VII Corps accomplished the campaign plan perfectly, and on 26 April relieved the fortress of Komárom. This forced the main Austrian forces based in the capital, except for 4,890 soldiers who were left to hold the fortress of Buda, to retreat to the Austrian border, thus liberating almost all of Hungary from Austrian occupation.
caption: Munkácsy Isaszegi csatatér (The Battlefield of Isaszeg)
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